[oom] So I do what I do and I do it my own way

[from_the_outside]

Her bruises from the fight with the Twelve Brothers hadn't been bad enough for her to ask for them to be healed, so her jaw and cheek and chest and arms are still dusted with purple and blue, now edging toward strange mustard yellow colors.

But it feels good. It feels right, the way hitting the tree had, the way hitting the center of that target had, the way sparring with the Jabari had. It all makes her feel more like herself.

And Agent Thirteen? She doesn't hang around waiting for someone to give her something to do.

She's kept from seeking out the Dora or their training grounds, but now, she makes her way to the wide plain where Ayo and Okoye are putting their soldiers through their paces. Evening is beginning to fall, and Sharon's timed her visit correctly – she hopes. If she's right, the session will be done in a few minutes, and Ayo will start making her way back towards the Citadel. 

She's hopeful the other woman will allow some company. She's not sure how else to ask what she needs to ask. But until then, she waits, watching patiently, as the Dora finish their practice.

Comments

[marvel_npc]

She is aware when Sharon Carter approaches the training grounds. Not only is the other woman not attempting stealth, but she herself is not the sort of person who is easily deceived. Ayo trades a look with General Okoye, who tips her head back in a minuscule nod of permission.

So, then. She will see what is to be seen. Once the day’s session has ended, she leaves the others to approach the Carter woman.

“Is there something you need?”

[from_the_outside]

"Ayo. Yes." She grimaces and shakes her head. "No. Something I want, maybe."

Sharon tips her head toward the Citadel in the distance. "Do you mind if I walk with you?"

[marvel_npc]

“Is there a reason I should mind?” She scrutinizes her for a moment, then tilts her head slightly to the side, toward the path back toward the Citadel.

“Unless there is somewhere else you wish to go?”

[from_the_outside]

"Hopefully not."

Her gaze is steady and clear on the other woman. "I came to talk to you, so I'll go wherever you want to go."

[marvel_npc]

“Mm. I see.” Ayo switches directions slightly toward a lesser-used path. “This way, then.”

She takes her glance over the other woman. “Unless you have deeper injuries that you are hiding.”

[from_the_outside]

"I don't."

Zero chance Bucky would let her be walking around with more serious injuries. He'd already been worried enough by her bruises. Sharon turns to offer Ayo the chance to start moving. "Thanks."

[marvel_npc]

“I have done nothing. Yet.”

She is curious about this woman, although she does not wish to let it show. Ayo starts along the path, following its curve.

“You look as though you have been in a fight.”

[from_the_outside]

"I was. But that's not why I'm here."

She pauses, then retracts. "Maybe it's a little bit why I'm here."

Sharon glances over at the other woman. "I know you know Bucky well. What do you know about me?"

[marvel_npc]

“I have not heard of this fight,” Ayo tells her, point-blank. “Why not?”

She looks back, watchful and intently curious at once, both of which she lets her see.

“Not as much as I would prefer. You have kept much to yourself, these past few months, save for a select few.”

[from_the_outside]

"Because it didn't have anything to do with the royal family or the Dora Milaje," Sharon tells her.

The woman's observation makes her smile, wry and crooked. "Yeah. Old habits."

And safety measures. But she's seen enough of Ayo to know the woman respects honesty, forthrightness. Transparency.

But, hell. It's still hard to push past. She makes the effort anyway. "In my previous life, I was something like one of your War Dogs." She cuts a glance at Ayo once more. "A spy. Sometimes a protector. A shield."

[marvel_npc]

Ayo gives her a scathing look. “You are a guest of the royal family. My honor is to wield my spear in their defense. If you have come to harm under our watch, while you are under the protection of King T’Challa’s word, it is very much my business, and that of the Dora Milaje. A strike at you is a strike at them.”

She lets that sink in, then adds, “Unless you are here to tell me that the White Wolf has done this to you.” Ayo does not believe it for an instant, but the question must be asked.

Shifting topics to follow the other’s revelation, she says, “I cannot say this is entirely a surprise.” Not with the crumbs of information that Nakia has mentioned about this woman that she knew before, not knowing what Nakia’s work in the world beyond had been. “A shield,” she repeats, and gives her a sharp look.

[from_the_outside]

“The White Wolf would throw himself off a cliff before he’d do this to me,” she says, sharp and fiercely loyal.

He hurt her once, when he didn’t have a choice and when he didn’t know her. He’ll never do it again. She knows it to the bottom of her soul.

She shakes it off to continue with her main point. You don’t ask for things, Bucky had said, and he wasn’t wrong. This is harder than facing down T’Challa had been on her first day here. “Yes,” she confirms, and breathes evenly.

“Wakanda has done so much for me. I came to see — to ask — if there’s anything I can do to help Wakanda.”

[marvel_npc]

“In that we are agreed,” Ayo tells her. It had been a point of great discussion when the White Wolf first arrived, but time has only confirmed their king’s judgment.

She leads them along the path that does not return to the Citadel but which goes elsewhere first, considering her out of the corner of her eye.

“There may be,” she allows, after a moment. “But why do you ask me, and not your friend Nakia? Or Shuri, in whose lab you assist? Or General Okoye?”

[from_the_outside]

“Nakia’s focused on the outreach program right now,” Sharon points out. “So is the princess. And when she’s not working on that, she’s working on Bucky’s arm or on the many projects she has already on her plate.”

She follows where Ayo leads without trepidation as she answers. “General Okoye’s purview is the military and the Dora. But you…”

Sharon slants a look at Ayo again. “You helped with the surveillance mission, and the mission to take out the poachers. You know where skills like mine might be useful. And you’re in a good position to use them.”

[marvel_npc]

Ayo makes a noncommittal sound. “Tell me, Sharon Carter, if the restrictions that bind you were lifted tomorrow that you might return to your country freely, what would you do?”

[from_the_outside]

“Depends.”

She turns a considering glance on Ayo. “In this rhetorical situation, can Bucky go home, too?”

[marvel_npc]

“That is not the question I asked,” Ayo says, sharply. “For a reason.”

[from_the_outside]

It’s a good question. If she could go home, if she could go back to work, what would she do?

She takes a few moments to think it over, not worried that Ayo will grow impatient. The woman asked this question for a reason. “I’d do what I could to clear my friends,” she tells the woman. “However I could, even if it meant leaving here. And then I’d get back to work.”

But maybe… maybe not with the Task Force. She wonders, for the first time, if there could possibly be room for someone like her on a team like the Avengers. “Wherever I’m needed.”

She turns her attention to back to the other they’re on. “And I’d try to pay Wakanda back for everything its people has done for me.”

[marvel_npc]

“Hmm,” Ayo says again. It is a good answer, she feels, and suspects that it is not merely the other woman trying to figure out what Ayo wants to hear.

“The Jabari speak well of you, did you know?”

[from_the_outside]

“I know.”

A small smile tugs at one corner of her mouth, satisfied and gratified in equal measure. “They gave me a new name.”

[marvel_npc]

“The Snow Leopard, yes?” Ayo glances at her.

[from_the_outside]

“Yes.”

She can still remember her surprised delight; the pride in Bucky’s face.

[marvel_npc]

Ayo nods. “So. Tell me, Sharon Carter, Snow Leopard, what do you know, truly know, of the Dora Milaje?”

[from_the_outside]

“Very little,” she admits, without trying to pretend otherwise. “Wakanda is full of secrets outsiders know nothing about. I know the Dora Milaje protect the royal family. I know they defend Wakanda. I know they’re fierce warriors, trained to precision.”

She shakes her head. “Not much else.”

[marvel_npc]

“Do you wish to learn?”